2018 FIFA World Cup Megathread

[Geneviev]

Well played France...

You stole Germany's title, but you deserved it more than Germany. You are forgiven.

Considering this, I agree, of course. We just did a horrible job.

I had higher expectations.

Jogi Löw has to be done after this humiliation.

[Lillorainen]

Considering this, I agree, of course. We just did a horrible job.

I had higher expectations.

Jogi Löw has to be done after this humiliation.

So did I. Not that I had expected them to be World Champions again - but being kicked out of group stage was the least I'd have expected.

Until 2014, Löw has done a good job, even leading us to championship. I do recognize that it's hard to replace players like Lahm, Klose, or Schweini. But there were too many flaws this time. Say, who would you think could be the next national coach for Germany? I quite could imagine Jürgen Klopp for this job.

[Geneviev]

I had higher expectations.

Jogi Löw has to be done after this humiliation.

So did I. Not that I had expected them to be World Champions again - but being kicked out of group stage was the least I'd have expected.

Until 2014, Löw has done a good job, even leading us to championship. I do recognize that it's hard to replace players like Lahm, Klose, or Schweini. But there were too many flaws this time. Say, who would you think could be the next national coach for Germany? I quite could imagine Jürgen Klopp for this job.

I think Julian Nagelsmann. He would be good too.

[Lillorainen]

So did I. Not that I had expected them to be World Champions again - but being kicked out of group stage was the least I'd have expected.

Until 2014, Löw has done a good job, even leading us to championship. I do recognize that it's hard to replace players like Lahm, Klose, or Schweini. But there were too many flaws this time. Say, who would you think could be the next national coach for Germany? I quite could imagine Jürgen Klopp for this job.

I think Julian Nagelsmann. He would be good too.

I agree. He's young, but he's experienced.

[Geneviev]

I think Julian Nagelsmann. He would be good too.

I agree. He's young, but he's experienced.

He saved Hoffenheim too. It's a good sign.

[Lillorainen]

I agree. He's young, but he's experienced.

He saved Hoffenheim too. It's a good sign.

He has clearly done an amazing job in Hoffenheim. Good guy.

[Shofercia]

To be fair, it's not like US has a chance of winning the World Cup. If the US qualifies and gets past the group stage - that'll be a miracle.

Unless they change the rules, we'll automatically qualify for 2026. 2022 is another matter, though.

And gets past the group stage... have fun with that with the new, 2026 format. One loss and it's hasta la vista, baby.

[Ko-oren]

Called it! Congratulations to France on the win. I'm very impressed with how much talent they have and how much they'll likely still have in 2-4-6-8 years for tournaments to come. I've heard people call their play boring, but honestly, I disagree. I'm seriously impressed with the defensive stability and still having offensive firepower (which everyone on NS Sports knows I'm a sucker for). Absolutely lethal team.

[Riemstagrad]

So, party-people, what should I say. Fortunately I reserved the opportunity to be wrong with my prediction, which I indeed was. Hmmst.

For the first, congratulations for milking a free kick, whatever on earth that was for (probably for what we commonly call a Schwalbe here). Then, that penalty - what the shit? Of course, it was unintentional. If you just jump up and the opponent player in front of you suddenly pulls his head down so the ball will hit your hand, what on earth are you supposed to do? Guessing from my quick skimming on this thread, I'm likely to be burnt at stake now, but for me, this was clearly not a situation that justifies a penalty!

And all this simulating in the second half ... yes, they were hit, but these hits were nowhere near anything that would seriously hurt anyone, especially not professional football/soccer/whatever-you-call-it players. I hate seeing this in the Bundesliga, and I surely hate it in international tournaments. This isn't fair play for me, and overdoing this, which I've clearly seen there, should generally have a Red Card following in my opinion. From the beginning, just to nip it off.

All in all, it was a clearly undeserved victory for me.

Thanks for nothing, referee.

But I'm not like this - it is how it is, no one can change football history. Félicitations, la France!

That's exactly the game i saw. France was wiped off the grass by Croatia. Those two first French goals came on the exact wrong moment for Croatia.

This extremely talented France is a small champion.

[Kohr]

Oh well. Maybe next time we'll get a first-time winner. Would have liked to see it be Croatia, though.

[Aboim]

Well, French passes were incredible inaccurate; Mbappé-Pogba attack only appeared after the third goal; Giroud… did something, in somewhere; Lloris gave an embarrassing gift; and Croatia just scored twice.

For me, the result and the penalty were fair because Perisic opened his hand to hit the ball. Yes, I expected a better game, but if Croatia didn’t have capacity to score more against this lacking France, I can’t see a problem. It’s not Griezmann’s fault. Moreover, the matches against Belgium and Argentina showed French ability.

[Geisenfried]

Interesting side note I noticed - this is the first time all four major individual awards (Golden Ball, Golden Boot, Golden Glove and Young Player) have gone to the four different semifinalists.

A lot of it's retrospective (they voted on the earlier cup's Best Young Player years after the fact, and we're basically counting all-star voted keepers for Golden Glove before it was officially awarded), but the closest times it's come to happening were 1966 (if Yashin had gotten the nod for all star as a predecessor for the award that would for a time be named after him instead of England's Gordon Banks, it would have been 4 for 4), 1974 (Lato and Zmuda doubled up for Poland, leaving Brazil out), 2006 (Klose and Podolski doubled up for Germany, leaving Portugal out) and 2010 (Germany again doubling up on awards with Mueller taking both the Golden Boot and Young Player). In 78 and 82, all 4 awards also went to semifinalists, but both times the respective champions had the Golden Boot winner take the Golden Ball as well as had the all-star keeper, meaning that all it took was the retrospective Young Player to be part of a semifinals team. In 1962, all four semifinalists had individual award winners, but that was because of a logjam for the Golden Boot - the retrospective Young Player went to Albert from Hungary, which didn't reach the semis.

[Relikai]

France played according to Croatia's weakness. Giving them large amounts of possession to wear them out, and attempting to play on the counter. Kante the bruiser was again in the middle of plenty of dirty work, but France was mostly toothless until Croatia decided to throw even more men forward, and an unfortunate positioning error by the keeper allowed in the last two goals.

Free kick goal was deserved as much as Croatia's second. Mandzukic decided to give it a poke, well done for being the first to score an own goal in a WC Final.

Penalty was fair as well, hand was open and away from the body which constitutes a handball.

Belgium would have an even easier time against this Croatian team. France's counterattacking ability seemed lacking ever since Argentina, even against a Croatia team which seemed to tire off after 70+ minutes. The reason why they played so hard early was so they could slack off and defend after achieving a draw or a lead against a youthful France, but unfortunately it wasn't the winning strategy.

[Bombadil]

Well.. all in all it was an entertaining World Cup though not necessarily for great football. A huge amount of goals from penalties or set plays, a record number of own goals.. but while there were some great entertaining matches there weren't really any matches where two top teams playing their best came up against each other. The closest was probably France-Belgium but it wasn't exactly a thrilling match.

Yet it was huge fun with lots of narratives and stories, from Germany crashing out 2-0 to South Korea, an early but memorable match in Spain-Portugal.. Russia beating Spain.. England's somewhat easy but friendly run, Japan being Japan and tidying up everywhere including a great game against Belgium.. and a country of just over 4M making it to the finals and giving France a serious run for their money.

I'd like to say Roll on Qatar but, for many reasons, I'm not especially happy it's being held there but then I guess I thought that about Russia and, well, hats off Russia and the Russians put on a great show.

Fin.

[Outer Sparta]

Well.. all in all it was an entertaining World Cup though not necessarily for great football. A huge amount of goals from penalties or set plays, a record number of own goals.. but while there were some great entertaining matches there weren't really any matches where two top teams playing their best came up against each other. The closest was probably France-Belgium but it wasn't exactly a thrilling match.

Yet it was huge fun with lots of narratives and stories, from Germany crashing out 2-0 to South Korea, an early but memorable match in Spain-Portugal.. Russia beating Spain.. England's somewhat easy but friendly run, Japan being Japan and tidying up everywhere including a great game against Belgium.. and a country of just over 4M making it to the finals and giving France a serious run for their money.

I'd like to say Roll on Qatar but, for many reasons, I'm not especially happy it's being held there but then I guess I thought that about Russia and, well, hats off Russia and the Russians put on a great show.

Fin.

Russia pleasantly put on a great World Cup. I don't know if Qatar can replicate Russia's success. In fact, they hardly have any football infrastructure in place.

[Bombadil]

Well.. all in all it was an entertaining World Cup though not necessarily for great football. A huge amount of goals from penalties or set plays, a record number of own goals.. but while there were some great entertaining matches there weren't really any matches where two top teams playing their best came up against each other. The closest was probably France-Belgium but it wasn't exactly a thrilling match.

Yet it was huge fun with lots of narratives and stories, from Germany crashing out 2-0 to South Korea, an early but memorable match in Spain-Portugal.. Russia beating Spain.. England's somewhat easy but friendly run, Japan being Japan and tidying up everywhere including a great game against Belgium.. and a country of just over 4M making it to the finals and giving France a serious run for their money.

I'd like to say Roll on Qatar but, for many reasons, I'm not especially happy it's being held there but then I guess I thought that about Russia and, well, hats off Russia and the Russians put on a great show.

Fin.

Russia pleasantly put on a great World Cup. I don't know if Qatar can replicate Russia's success. In fact, they hardly have any football infrastructure in place.

I mean they're going to build all these white elephants for what is essentially a PR campaign for Qatar, great they can afford to waste the money but it's left places like Brazil and South Africa with stadiums that are no better than crumbling car parks these days.

[Outer Sparta]

Russia pleasantly put on a great World Cup. I don't know if Qatar can replicate Russia's success. In fact, they hardly have any football infrastructure in place.

I mean they're going to build all these white elephants for what is essentially a PR campaign for Qatar, great they can afford to waste the money but it's left places like Brazil and South Africa with stadiums that are no better than crumbling car parks these days.

And they build their stadiums with slave labor. If FIFA wasn't so tainted with corruption maybe they would award the World Cup to another Asian country like Japan or South Korea or even Australia.

[Infected Mushroom]

As a long-time supporter of France, it brings me considerable satisfaction that the FIFA campaign ended as it did.

I believe this may well be the start of a decade plus of absolute French domination in competitive football. With Germany severely undermined and in need of reforms and much of South America in disarray... this is the time for France to win more and more victories in the future.

[Geisenfried]

As a long-time supporter of France, it brings me considerable satisfaction that the FIFA campaign ended as it did.

I believe this may well be the start of a decade plus of absolute French domination in competitive football. With Germany severely undermined and in need of reforms and much of South America in disarray... this is the time for France to win more and more victories in the future.

Up until the disaster in Russia, Germany had been fairly solidly dominant - winning the 2014 World Cup, a perfect 10-0-0 record in 2018 qualifying, comfortably taking the Confederations Cup in 2017 - really, the only blemish was dropping a semi to hosts France for Euro 2016, which is hardly a world-ending result. Really, given how strong they've performed over the last 5 years or so, the result of what happened here at the World Cup is all the more stunning.

It all looks great until suddenly nothing's working and you're on the outside looking in on something you probably took for granted.

[Infected Mushroom]

As a long-time supporter of France, it brings me considerable satisfaction that the FIFA campaign ended as it did.

I believe this may well be the start of a decade plus of absolute French domination in competitive football. With Germany severely undermined and in need of reforms and much of South America in disarray... this is the time for France to win more and more victories in the future.

Up until the disaster in Russia, Germany had been fairly solidly dominant - winning the 2014 World Cup, a perfect 10-0-0 record in 2018 qualifying, comfortably taking the Confederations Cup in 2017 - really, the only blemish was dropping a semi to hosts France for Euro 2016, which is hardly a world-ending result. Really, given how strong they've performed over the last 5 years or so, the result of what happened here at the World Cup is all the more stunning.

It all looks great until suddenly nothing's working and you're on the outside looking in on something you probably took for granted.

I actually believed that there would be another France vs Germany battle in this tournament. But Germany could not even make it past Korea...

[Geisenfried]

Up until the disaster in Russia, Germany had been fairly solidly dominant - winning the 2014 World Cup, a perfect 10-0-0 record in 2018 qualifying, comfortably taking the Confederations Cup in 2017 - really, the only blemish was dropping a semi to hosts France for Euro 2016, which is hardly a world-ending result. Really, given how strong they've performed over the last 5 years or so, the result of what happened here at the World Cup is all the more stunning.

It all looks great until suddenly nothing's working and you're on the outside looking in on something you probably took for granted.

I actually believed that there would be another France vs Germany battle in this tournament. But Germany could not even make it past Korea...

Germany over France was my pre-tournament pick, so yeah, I understand. And as someone who owns both 2014 World Cup champion kits, I'm veeeerrrry disappointed in the outcome...

[Infected Mushroom]

I actually believed that there would be another France vs Germany battle in this tournament. But Germany could not even make it past Korea...

Germany over France was my pre-tournament pick, so yeah, I understand. And as someone who owns both 2014 World Cup champion kits, I'm veeeerrrry disappointed in the outcome...

I think the Germans may have also underestimated the Mexican morale to fight and prove to the world their worth. It turns out that Trump may have had a ripple effect...

[Minoa]

I think the Germans may have also underestimated the Mexican morale to fight and prove to the world their worth. It turns out that Trump may have had a ripple effect...

I question the connection: football performance can be volatile, and can affect any country. It is possible for last year’s champions in a league to get relegated in the next, through a few simple mistakes: one example includes how David Moyes scuppered Manchester United, despite winning the premier league in the final year under Sir Alex Ferguson. Allegations of foreign interference wasn’t a big thing back then.

[The Blaatschapen]

Yes!

Germany is not world champion anymore!

Wooo!

[Relikai]

I think the Germans may have also underestimated the Mexican morale to fight and prove to the world their worth. It turns out that Trump may have had a ripple effect...

I question the connection: football performance can be volatile, and can affect any country. It is possible for last year’s champions in a league to get relegated in the next, through a few simple mistakes: one example includes how David Moyes scuppered Manchester United, despite winning the premier league in the final year under Sir Alex Ferguson. Allegations of foreign interference wasn’t a big thing back then.

Ditto. Suddenly Leicester wins the league, and they’re in danger of relegation the next season. Just because the WC was won doesn’t mean consistent winnings throughout the decade. Spain managed to do so with a revolutionary style rendered obsolete now, and France was more than lucky in a few close matches.